ENG-1952 — Page 108

HONG KONG ANNUAL REPORT, 1952

Whilst locally manufactured cigarettes form the bulk of consumption, considerable quantities of ciga- rettes are imported from the United Kingdom and the United States of America.

Textiles

This is undoubtedly one of Hong Kong's more important industries and covers all processes including cotton, silk and wool spinning, weaving, knitting, dyeing, finishing and printing. It also includes the manufacture of made-up garments such as shirts, pyjamas and underclothing and provides employment for 30,000 workers.

Of the twenty-five factories engaged in various types of spinning, thirteen cotton mills operating approximately 205,000 spindles have a monthly produc- tion of 14,000 to 15,000 400-lbs. bales of cotton yarn. Production covers a range of counts from tens to forty- twos singles but a number of mills are equipped for manufacturing twofold yarns. In addition there are three factories producing satisfactory qualities of sewing threads. Of the total output about 40 to 50% is taken up by local consumption in the Colony's weaving and knitting mills, the balance being exported to markets in the Far East; the most important being Indonesia, Pakistan, Formosa, Burma, Thailand and South Korea. During 1952, exports exceeded 80,000 bales valued at approximately £8,600,000.

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Some of the spinning mills are also equipped for weaving, but in addition there are nearly 130 weaving factories operating 4,000 power looms. There are also a considerable number of hand looms in both factories and private houses. The capacity for cloth production, based on 36′′ wide sheeting and calculated on full time

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